


i'd give you a morning

by oflights



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: ABBA, Fluff, M/M, Team Bonding, Wilderness Survival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-08
Packaged: 2020-01-06 05:14:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18381680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oflights/pseuds/oflights
Summary: Nate plans a wilderness retreat for the team, but Gabe has a plan of his own.





	i'd give you a morning

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [Springsteen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Springsteen/pseuds/Springsteen) in the [wesmashing](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/wesmashing) collection. 



> thanks to em for the really fun prompt; you know a good ensemble will always call to me, and i had a good time with this one! i hope you enjoy it. ♥
> 
> thanks to bridget for the quick beta and to everyone who helped with/participated in the challenge! :D

Gabe has a plan.

The plan makes him sort of grateful for somehow being stuck on rookie duty, ferrying them the several miles from the airport to the middle of nowhere Wyoming Nate had decided their team-building retreat needed to be. Gabe’s not sure why Nate gets to decide these things—he didn’t even win the Hart, a fact only EJ is brave enough to throw in his face from time to time when it looks like his ego is getting out of control—but apparently he does, so apparently here they all are, driving down an endless, utterly deserted stretch of highway in a rental in Wyoming in the middle of January.

It’s a good thing Gabe has a plan. 

And rookie duty means he gets to run the plan by the rookies and even recruit them to be a part of the plan. Not necessarily in that order, of course.

“So what do you think?” Gabe asks, first glancing back at Kerfy and JT in the backseat and then giving Josty an encouraging smile next to him in the passenger seat. 

Josty gives him two big thumbs up and says, “You got this, Cap. It’s a great plan.”

“Don’t you think it’s a little cheesy?” Kerfy asks, and Gabe hears a light thud and a sharp, “Ow! What, he asked what we thought, I’m gonna tell him!”

“I think cheesy is perfect for Barrie,” JT says loudly. He kind of always talks really loud to Gabe; right now it’s making Josty snicker to himself. “And you’ve really thought this through.”

Gabe beams at him in the rearview mirror, not breaking even when JT goes a little pink. “Awesome, man. That’s exactly what I want to hear.”

JT goes pinker, and now it’s Kerfy’s turn to hit him, which turns into a backseat wrestling match that Gabe blithely ignores to turn back to Josty. 

“Really, you think he’ll go for it?” 

He’s not sure why he’s asking Josty, the youngest person in the car, who had yelled “Shotgun!” and swung his duffel bag into JT’s gut when he tried to cut him off and make it into the passenger seat ahead of him, knocking him to the ground. Josty isn’t going to have any extra insight into Tyson and what he wants and likes just because they have the same name. 

But Josty’s grinning the way he always is, cheerful even in the face of the gray, endless horizon in front of them as they push on to their destination. “He’s gonna be so into it, man, I’m telling you. You’ll have him locked down so fast.”

Gabe winces a little. “I mean, I just want to try dating, that’s all. It’s not that big of a deal, it’s just—”

It’s just that they’ve hooked up a few times now—three times this season, once even marginally sober, and have never gotten around to talking about anything like that. He’s kind of in the dark about how Tyson feels about him beyond being very into his dick—he’d made that clear by saying, “Fuck, I love your dick,” once after a particularly good fuck—but he’s never found the words to just ask Tyson. 

Things have always felt a little fragile, with their positions on the team and locker room chemistry to think of. At least, that was what Gabe always told himself whenever another morning passed and Tyson had dragged himself back to his place with barely enough time to get to practice on his own so they wouldn’t arrive together, even though they’ve totally carpooled without dicks involved before and it wouldn’t be all that weird. 

He told himself that until it became apparent a few weeks ago that most of the team knew they were hooking up. That became apparent when EJ said, “So are you actually into that clown or is the sex that good somehow?” Then Colesy said something stupid about bad sex and bad pizza, and Nate muttered something about feeling bad for his girlfriend, and the conversation had kind of spiraled away the way it usually does, but the important thing was that EJ talked about it openly at a table full of Avs and no one had seemed fazed or surprised or even all that interested.

So, most of the guys know, and Gabe knows how he feels, and so the only question left is how Tyson feels. Which the plan is supposed to help him figure out.

“I just don’t know if a wilderness retreat in the middle of nowhere is the best place to pitch woo,” Kerfy’s voice comes from the backseat. It’s a little muffled because JT has him in a headlock, but he still sounds flatly skeptical. 

Gabe winces again, because he’s had the same thought. It’s not like Tyson, or any of them except Nate really, wants to be here. He’s going to be crabby and mad that he’s not spending his bye week on a beach somewhere like he usually does. Gabe had even had some fantasies about joining Tyson on a beach, where there was no snow or highway or hiking trails or most of their hockey team joining them. It would be awesome. 

But Gabe’s the captain and Nate was earnest in wanting people to share in the apparently transcendent experience he’d had on his own in Wyoming on a past bye week trip; he truly seemed to think this could bring the team together and buoy a playoff push. He couldn’t in good conscience argue with that, and he couldn’t give Tyson an out for it either. 

So here they are, in Wyoming, and Gabe could wait for all this; the plan isn’t location dependent. He can adapt. But he’s a little worried about losing his nerve, about letting them fall back into old routines and just getting comfortable again with being an every once in a while situation. That’s the thing about hooking up with one of your best friends: it can take a pretty big shock to the system to change anything. So maybe Wyoming is essential. Maybe there is a transcendent experience to be had here, just probably not one that Nate has in mind. 

Gabe doesn’t know how to articulate any of that to Kerfy and doesn’t particularly want to—JT and Josty have been infinitely more helpful today—so he’s grateful when JT answers instead.

“What the _fuck_ does ‘pitch woo’ mean?” he demands, and Josty cracks up in the seat next to him, craning his neck back to look. 

“I think he meant wood, right? Like, pitch a tent?” His grin has turned familiarly wicked. “Probably gonna be too cold for smashing so it makes sense.”

“We’re not going to be in tents,” JT says, still sounding utterly lost and very annoyed about it. He kicks the back of Gabe’s seat. “Right? Tell me Mack got us cabins or something. I’m not sleeping on the ground, Gabe.”

“That’s not what I—I seriously can’t believe either of you ever went to college,” Kerfy says, aghast.

“Kerf, who uses the term ‘pitch woo’ in this day and age?” Gabe asks, not buying it. He knows when Kerfy’s just trying to brag. 

“It’s a totally valid term!”

“Sure it is.”

“Why do you guys keep saying wood like that?” JT asks, and Kerfy explodes.

“It’s woo, not wood! The word is woo!” 

“Stop fighting,” Gabe says, like he hadn’t just instigated this whole thing. As Kerfy and JT start hitting each other in the backseat and Josty somehow cheers them both on, Gabe tightens his hands on the steering wheel and sighs, shaking his head.

It’s a good thing he has a good plan, because otherwise this might be a really long bye week. 

 

 

They are indeed in cabins, no tents; Gabe’s first sight of Tyson is when he’s standing on the front porch of one of the cabins, rubbing his hands together furiously and looking outraged.

“There are _bunk beds_ ,” Tyson tells Gabe instead of any kind of greeting. Gabe can’t help grinning widely; that’s actually kind of perfect. Tyson squawks at him. “Hello? It’s like summer camp but cold. Winter camp. What the fuck Gabriel, can’t you do something about this?”

“Nope,” Gabe says cheerfully, spreading his arms wide and shaking his head. It’s definitely cold, the air crisp and tight around them, the snow and gravel crunching with ice beneath his boots. “We all agreed, we’re all in, and Nate’s running the show.”

As if hearing his name, Nate bangs his way out of the cabin Tyson’s standing in front of. He’s in full cold weather gear, complete with sleek hiking parka and a bandana tied around his head, backpack on even though the sun is already going down. Gabe’s already starting to regret his words a little, but he doesn’t let that show on his face.

“Good, you’re here. Get your stuff set up and then get your gear so we can start out on the trail.”

“Excuse me?” Tyson asks, whirling around to glare. “It’s dark out!”

“Exactly,” Nate says, holding up a flashlight. “That’s the point. It’s a trust walk.”

“It’s a what now?” Tyson doesn’t actually let Nate explain—he clearly doesn’t care—but barrels forward. “I’m hungry, it took us the whole fucking day to get here—”

“What’s the point of a _wilderness_ retreat if it’s not remote?” Nate grumbles, shaking his head. Tyson keeps going. 

“—and I’m not doing any _trust walks_ until I get some foo—” He breaks off, spluttering, when Nate throws a granola bar at his face. 

“Eat up,” Nate says, his grin big and wicked. He looks at Gabe, who puts his hands up in the most conciliatory manner he knows. “You with me?”

“Always,” Gabe says without hesitation, working very hard not to laugh at the look of utter betrayal Tyson gives him. 

He only rethinks his stance a few times when the actual trust walk begins. The first time is when Nate reveals there is only one flashlight, and he has it—“I’ll light the way, and you guys follow behind me in a line,” he says, his voice firm and level with a hint of challenge in it as he addresses the whole grumbly squad. “Just pay attention to the guy in front of you, stick to the trail, and we’ll be fine. A team is only as weak as its weakest link.”

“Someone is going to die,” EJ tells Nate; he sounds a bit gleeful about it, his mouth curved wide in his signature smile. Nate rolls his eyes but doesn’t otherwise respond and Gabe wonders if he secretly agrees. 

“No one’s dying,” Gabe says, giving Nate a big thumbs up. Apparently that’s enough of a vote of confidence to get the guys lining up.

Though Tyson does his absolute very best to try and get right behind Nate, Gabe has a plan, the rookies are in on the plan, and EJ is just a huge dick who’s not in on anything. So Tyson winds up in about the middle of the line, behind every single guy on an ELC, EJ, and right behind Gabe, who gives him a calm, reassuring pat on the shoulder. 

“Just follow me,” Gabe says, and Tyson looks at him like he’s out of his mind. 

“How are you letting him get away with this? It’s fucking dark out, there’s snow on the ground, there’s probably bears or wolverines out there—”

“Do wolverines really live in Wyoming?” Willy asks, lining up behind Tyson and also giving him a reassuring pat. Tyson turns to glare at him.

“ _Yes_ , there are, I looked it up!” He thrusts his phone out at Willy just in time for Nate to pass by and grab it out of his hand. 

“No phones,” he says, putting it in his backpack and moving on to confiscate more. Gabe and Willy have to restrain Tyson from running at Nate and tackling him and maybe strangling him too, judging by the way his hands are kind of clawing at empty air. 

“It’s gonna be fine,” Gabe says, arms wrapped around Tyson’s middle. He ducks his mouth close to Tyson’s ear and tells him, “I’ll protect you from the wolverines, I promise.”

Tyson shivers a little and calms down, looking up at Gabe for a heavy, slightly charged moment. But then Willy adds, “And I’ll protect you from the bears,” in his most calming, trustworthy voice and the moment is broken. Gabe swears inwardly and thinks he really needs to get Willy in on the plan. 

And then they get ready to start the hike and Tyson hooks his fingers into the back of Gabe’s belt loop and he thinks maybe the plan is in better shape than he thought.

Certainly the walk seems to be helping at first, as they start off through the trail behind the light of Nate’s flashlight. The first part of it goes through a clearing into the woods, and even though it is dark out, the moonlight is bright against the snow. It only dims a little as they head into the trees.

Tyson sticks close to him anyway, so that Gabe can feel his warmth through the layers of their winter clothes, bumping into his back and grumbling about it. Gabe wants to reach back and take his hand but restrains himself—they’re not quite there yet, he has to stick to the plan—but he doesn’t ever move away out of Tyson’s reach, sticking just as close as Tyson does, even if it makes him lag behind Mikko a bit. 

Mikko turns to smirk back at him a few times when he realizes, and then he trips over a tree root and knocks JT over, so Gabe says, “Karma!” and refuses to explain himself, just gets everyone laughing at Mikko. 

Up ahead, Nate calls back, “No goofing off!” and then swears loudly as EJ cuffs him in the back of the head. 

They keep walking. It’s really not so bad; the air smells wintery and woodsy and sharp, clearing Gabe’s head from the fog of Tyson’s closeness. The moon is fat and bright overhead, filtering through the trees. Nobody trips again after Mikko, though there’s some stumbling along. 

“See?” Gabe murmurs, slowing down enough that Tyson bumps into him, front pressed to Gabe’s back. “It’s not so bad. We got this.”

“I’m hungry,” Tyson mutters back. “And I’m cold.”

“Where are your gloves, man?”

“I forgot them in my car,” Tyson says mournfully, and Gabe stifles a laugh. He stifles another, different sound when Tyson’s cold hands suddenly creep up the back of his parka, under his shirt, resting in the dip of the small of his back as Tyson sticks very close to him. He swallows hard and stays slow-moving, even though Mikko is getting further and further up ahead, the black of his jacket starting to blend into the deeper part of the woods—

“Uh, guys?” Willy suddenly calls, so suddenly it makes everyone freeze, even Nate. Gabe finds himself blinded by sudden light as Nate whirls the flashlight back around on them, and he covers his face with his hand. “Hey, we’re missing some people.” 

Gabe turns, blinking owlishly over Tyson’s shoulder, and curses—Z had been behind Willy and now he and anybody else who had been behind him is missing from the trail. 

“Goddamn it,” Nate says, light from the flashlight shaking as he kicks a nearby tree. “I’m going to _kill_ him.”

“Not if the wolverine gets him first!” Tyson shouts, and everyone starts talking at once then, making scared exclamations about wolverines, calling out for Z, Ghetto, Barbs, Nietsy and Grubi, yelling at Nate to pass out more flashlights.

“There aren’t any more flashlights,” Nate says, looking sullen and furious. “That’s the whole point, it’s one light that everyone follows, as long as everyone stays in line nobody should get lost.”

“Where the hell did you get this stuff?” Tyson asks, but as soon as he asks the question Gabe suddenly knows. 

He groans out loud as Nate says in his most stubborn voice, “Factor’s dad.” 

There’s a dull silence as everyone who actually understands what that means processes it. Then EJ starts laughing, doubling over, and Tyson throws his hands up at the sky and says, “Fantastic! Terrific! We’re here doing team-building under the direction of a lunatic!” 

“He’s really good at self-help stuff, come on,” Nate says, and when Tyson just scoffs at him, his face hardens. “And maybe you shouldn’t be throwing stones in glass houses that have crazy dads in them, Tys.”

“All right!” Gabe yells as Tyson splutters indignantly and turns bright red. “That’s enough. Let’s just—Nate, you have our phones, let’s use the lights and find the others.”

“Should we split up?” Willy asks as Nate, grumbling, unzips the backpack and starts passing phones out. Gabe thinks about it, shakes his head, but then remembers why they’re here and looks back at Nate.

“What do you think, man?”

He can tell Nate’s embarrassed, but he shakes his head and keeps looking stubborn. “No way, let’s stay together. That’s the whole point of this, right?” 

“Right,” Gabe says. “We’ll be fine as long as we’re together.” He presses closer to Tyson, and this time gives in to his earlier urge and takes his hand as the group moves past them, no longer in a very neat line but still following Nate as he storms through the trees, yelling out, “You’re dead when I find you, Zadorov!” 

“It’s gonna be fine,” Gabe tells Tyson, squeezing his hand. Tyson rolls his eyes. 

“I know, come on. They probably just went to get food like the rest of us should be doing. This whole thing is stupid.”

“Then stop harping on the wolverine.”

“As soon as I stop harping on the wolverine, the wolverine is going to attack.” Tyson sniffs and points two fingers from the hand Gabe’s not holding at his eyes. “Constant vigilance, Gabriel.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“It’s from Harry Potter but I forgot you don’t know how to read.”

“Oh shut up,” Gabe says, laughing maybe too loudly. He thinks of the plan, and the way his heart is pounding and how Tyson hasn’t let go of his hand. “Maybe I’ll read them sometime.”

Tyson looks at him like he’d sprouted a second head. “Seriously?”

“Yeah, why not?” He leans in close, like he’s telling a big secret. “I do actually know how to read, you know.”

“I don’t believe that,” Tyson tells him, and he’s the one that laughs too loudly this time. 

It’s enough for EJ to glance back at them and go, “Well I’m glad you guys are having fun in the middle of a _crisis_.” 

Before Gabe can tell him what an asswipe he is, Nate’s voice carries over from ahead, “Oh for fuck’s _sake_!”

Within 10 minutes, they’ve found the others in another clearing outside of a much larger cabin than the ones they’re supposed to sleep in. Outside that cabin is a large hot tub, large enough to house all of their missing teammates. They’re all lounging in the water in their underwear, their clothes thrown over the porch railing of the cabin, and not a single one of them look the least bit sorry, especially not Z.

“Come warm up,” Z says, grinning big. Grubi is dozing off next to him with his head back and his arms spread wide.

So Gabe has to detach from Tyson to stop Nate from drowning Z in the hot tub, and then he has to facilitate apologies between the teammates that had wandered off and the teammates that went looking for them. At the end of all that it’s getting pretty late and they’re all hungry and tired and cold, so they head into the big cabin which winds up being something of a mess hall and eat the prepped healthy meals the kitchen is stocked with. 

“After all that, we don’t even get to make s’mores,” Tyson grumbles, but he’s sitting next to Gabe and shoving food into his mouth, a warm line against his side, and Gabe can’t really commiserate properly. 

He lends Tyson his gloves on the walk back to their cabins but still holds his hand, and Tyson finally smiles. 

 

 

Despite how the first activity had ended up, Nate doesn’t exactly give them a break for the rest of the week. The next day they get up with the sun, eat breakfast, and then are tasked with carrying big rocks up a mountain trail in teams. 

Captains and alternates pick their teams, so Gabe gets to say, “Tyson,” and then grin widely at both of them when they squawk at him. 

“He means me,” Tyson says, shoving Josty into JT and then starting forward to join Gabe and their big rock. He misses Josty grinning big and giving Gabe a huge, exaggerated thumbs behind him, before he gets claimed for Nate’s team. “Thank god,” he says to Gabe, eyes wide as he looks over the rock. “Pick Z next and make him carry it.”

“I think we’re supposed to take turns,” Gabe says, peering over at the other teams to see what they’re doing. EJ has Kerf going to work with a ruler and something that looks like an enormous baby björn fashioned out of a pajama shirt; on Nate’s team, Mikko and Barbs are arguing over what to name their rock. 

“Fuck that,” Tyson says. “It’s a stupid rock. I’m not going to fall down a mountain for a stupid rock.” 

“The first team that gets to the checkpoint with the burgundy flag gets the afternoon off,” Nate calls, and Tyson’s eyes go even wider. 

“Never mind,” he says. “What’s our plan here, Captain?”

For once, Gabe does not have a plan for this. He doesn’t want anyone pulling any muscles lugging the big rock around, but he has no idea what else they can do. “We just have to take turns,” Gabe says, shrugging helplessly. Everyone groans. “I’ll take first turn,” he tells them valiantly, and everyone just groans again.

They agree on 5 minute intervals carrying the rock. Gabe says, “Remember to lift with your legs, not your back,” and then almost falls over following his own advice. Z does relieve him soon enough, though, and while Tyson tries to convince him to just keep going, come on, he’s in the zone!—Z passes the rock to Tyson after 5 minutes, smiling happily at him. 

“Hurry so we go back to hot tub,” Z says, and Tyson swears at him.

“ _You_ don’t even have to be here, Satan,” Tyson tells Z, and Gabe marvels at the fact that he can actually speak while carrying the rock; Gabe could barely breathe. They’ve hit a relatively level part of the trail but Tyson still seems more interested in ripping Z than his struggle. “Guys with families were allowed to go to Disney World or whatever. _I_ want to go to Disney World.”

“Have babies, Tys,” Z says cheerfully, and he winks at Gabe with zero subtlety. Gabe feels his face go red. 

“Look, it’s totally fine for adults to go to Disney World,” Tyson says, huffing a little. He’s cradling the rock to his chest like it’s an actual toddler. “Who wants to go to Disney World with me?”

“Don’t you want to do Harry Potter World?” JT asks, and Tyson starts whining about how he wants to go to both and doesn’t stop until he gives JT the rock.

“I’ll go to Disney World with you,” Gabe says as Tyson doubles over, catching his breath. “And the Harry Potter thing.” 

“Yeah?”

“Sure.”

“Let’s go, then,” Tyson says. They watch JT stagger along with the rock before, wheezing, he pushes it onto Grubi, who says, “It’s not my turn!” and drops it onto the ground. Then they watch the rock roll down the slope and take out EJ’s team like they’re bowling pins. 

“We really, really should go,” Gabe says, because now EJ is shouting about cheating and sabotage and Kerfy and Sammy are packing snow around their rock to “protect it” where they’ve been dragging it along behind them in that fucked up pajama shirt, and Z has decided it’d be a good idea to throw a snowball at Kerfy and suddenly they’re at war. 

Needless to say, Nate’s team is the only one to actually make it to the checkpoint. The rest of them get into a monster of a snowball fight and then all trudge back to the mess hall cabin together, icy and bruised and laughing at each other, the rocks abandoned on the trail. 

Kerfy keeps looking back at his in a wistful sort of way until JT puts an arm around him and promises him that they’ll adopt a rock of their own when they get home. They’re all taking turns in the hot tub again when Nate and his team find them, extremely unimpressed. 

“We waited at the checkpoint for an hour,” Nate says.

“We thought you were _dead_ ,” Josty says, popping up over Nate’s shoulder and adding a dramatic gasp for effect. 

“I think we all learned valuable lessons today,” Tyson says, though he refuses to elaborate on what those lessons were or how they learned them. He’s in the hot tub, slowly going pink and relaxed, and Gabe wants to get in with him but he’d let the younger guys go ahead of him and now he has a lot of regrets. 

He has a lot more regrets when they have to spend the afternoon chopping wood until the sun goes down; nobody gets the afternoon off, not even Nate’s team, and everyone lets Nate have it about that. Gabe has to stop JT and Josty from clanging their axes against each other like swords and Tyson calls over, “They’re not coming to Disney World with us,” and Gabe can’t really stop smiling after that, regrets and all. 

 

 

Over the next few days, they’re almost too busy for Gabe to really put his plan into motion. Nate has a seemingly endless list of Brian O’Reilly-inspired activities, all of which they fail miserably at each time. Gabe considers it a miracle that no one has fallen through a sheet of ice yet or tried to wrestle Tyson’s wolverine, and making sure none of those things happen takes up a lot of Gabe’s energy. 

So does supporting Nate, who really does mean well while he’s driving everyone crazy. There’s a night when they all stay up late around the big fire pit that sits in the middle of all their cabins, and the expanse of stars above them is really absolutely wild, thick and bright over their heads. Nate can’t take his eyes off them, finally looking somewhat peaceful and calm, and says, “See, this is what I wanted you guys to see.”

And they all kind of go quiet and look up at them together for a little while, before EJ says, “Wouldn’t it be more appropriate if we got to see an avalanche?”

“I wish you would fall off the mountain,” Nate says with a big, happy sigh. 

It’s nice, being outside with his teammates, squished between Mikko and Willy, watching the firelight flicker over Tyson’s face across the way. This is better than hauling rocks or leading people blindfolded over a frozen creek or building a shelter out of sticks or any of the other stupid shit Nate has had them doing. It sort of makes the bunkbeds, the early mornings and the same meals all day worth it. 

Gabe looks at Tyson again and thinks that tomorrow, if things go right, it could all be more than worth it. Tomorrow before they head back to Colorado, the plan is on, and he still feels really good about it.

Of course, the next day Gabe wakes up, leaves his cabin, and discovers that Tyson is missing. So that kind of puts a damper on things. 

It takes him about 10 minutes for them all to put together what’s going on: this is another kind of trust exercise, the last one, and Nate’s not going to give them any hints about what to do or where Tyson is. That only lasts about another 10 minutes of everyone just kind of standing around, trying to decide what to do—“I vote we just leave him here,” EJ says, and JT says, “Only if we can leave Nate too,” and they get a little further into that negotiation than Gabe really likes—before Nate groans and tells everyone that they’re useless and then leads them through the woods.

They find Tyson at the bottom of a ravine, sitting on a boulder with his arms crossed over his chest. “Thank god,” he calls up at them, waving his arms around like he’s difficult to see. “Nate’s gone crazy, he _threw_ me down here, I know the wolverine is close—”

“How’d you get him down there?” Gabe asks, genuinely curious. It’s a pretty steep drop, not jumpable. 

Nate shrugs. “I was gonna lower him down with the zip line harness but I told him there was booze down there and he just started climbing on his own. He got there way faster than I thought he would.”

“There’s no booze down there, is there?”

“Nope.” 

“Nice.” 

Tyson is still yelling about attempted murder. Gabe tries not to get annoyed with Nate as he announces the obvious challenge—they have to figure out a way to get Tyson out of there, together as a team, or nobody goes home. 

“We should definitely leave him,” EJ says, and way too many people agree, so Gabe has to sigh and rally the troops. 

“Come on, we’ll think of something. Why don’t we—you think he’d just climb up if we told him there was booze up here?”

“I don’t think he’ll fall for that one twice,” Nate says.

“Do you have some kind of backup plan?”

“Nope. We’ve gotta do it.” Gabe is pretty sure that that can’t be true, but he’s not sure how much he’d bet on it. So instead he calls for ideas, looking to Kerfy first, who throws his hands up in frustration.

“You know I was an econ major, not engineering, right? Why the hell would I know how to deal with this?”

“Fine,” Gabe says, trying not to snap at him. “Fine, we’ll just—do you still have the zip line harness?” 

“Yep.” 

“We can lower it down and pull him back up.”

“No!” yells Tyson from down below. “I can’t climb that high!”

“Yes you can!” Gabe yells back.

“Someone come get me!”

“That doesn’t make any sense!”

“None of this makes sense! I wanted to go to Hawaii! It’s not fair!”

“I think someone needs to go get him, and the rest of us need to pull you both up,” Nate says, sounding all thoughtful and inquisitive like that hadn’t been his one and only idea from the start. He raises his voice. “It’s going to take _all_ of us to pull that much weight, guys. But we can do it together.”

“The next time we play the Blues, I’m going to punch Ryan in the face and tell him that’s for introducing you to his dad,” Gabe says, because he knows perfectly well who is going to be the one to climb down with the zip line harness and get Tyson, and this was _not_ the plan. 

Nate smiles at him and holds up a second zip line harness. “Whatever you need to motivate you.” 

It’s a slow, harrowing process, climbing down the wall of the ravine. Gabe curses Nate the whole time, curses EJ when he hears, “So are we leaving both of them now?” from up above, and above all curses Tyson for falling for Nate’s blatant tricks. He’s out of breath and sweating beneath his winter layers when he finally reaches the bottom, enough that he almost can’t even enjoy Tyson slamming into him with a hug. 

“My hero,” Tyson says, squeezing him tight. “I thought I’d never see you again.” 

“You’ve been down here like half an hour, right?”

“Long enough to forget your face,” Tyson says into his neck. “Your musk.”

“You’re a moron. Come on, let’s climb up.”

“There was supposed to be whiskey down here,” Tyson tells him mournfully, and it sounds like that’s the worst part for him. Gabe rolls his eyes but holds Tyson close for a few moments, until he hears calls from above to hurry up.

So he gets Tyson in the harness and secures it to his own, then tugs on the line held up above them. “We’re coming up, start pulling!” Gabe yells, and there are a few panicky seconds where nothing happens, until he starts feeling the tugging pressure on the line. 

Tyson is no help, of course, letting himself be dragged up by Gabe and the rest of his teammates, telling Gabe that that’s the whole point of the exercise, he’ll ruin it if he does anything else. EJ threatens to drop them, Gabe threatens to pull EJ down with him, and after trading a few more insults and a lot of groaning and complaining, Gabe and Tyson are pulled up over the side of the ravine.

The guys are all sweating and lying down on various parts of the cold ground except for Nate, who is beaming. “We did it!” he yells, whooping happily in triumph. “We actually got him up, oh man, I totally thought we’d have to call the park rangers or something, I told them we might need help.” 

“What is _wrong_ with you?” Gabe says. He’s still holding onto Tyson, and he’s not sure if it’s to keep himself from attacking Nate or if it’s just because. Maybe both.

“I finally got us to work together as a team, so I’d say I made the right call,” Nate says. He is way too smug, patting guys on the back, throwing words of encouragement at the younger guys, telling everyone, “I knew we could do it, I knew it,” like he hadn’t actually had a full-on backup plan. 

“Disney World,” Tyson mutters, dropping his forehead onto Gabe’s shoulder. “We deserve another bye week after this.”

“We really do,” Gabe says, squeezing Tyson tight.

 

 

After that, there’s barely any time at all before they have to be at the airport to make their late flight home. They trudge back to their cabins, pack their stuff up into their rentals. Gabe is bone-tired and not at all ready for the traveling he has ahead of them, but he also hasn’t forgotten about the plan, and it’s now or never. He steels himself a bit and then tells Kerfy, “Switch cars with Tyson, okay?” 

Kerfy balks for a moment, then looks around and realizes what he means. “Oh geez, you’re still doing it, huh?”

“Yep. I’m pitching woo.” 

“You don’t think all the rescue mission was enough?”

“No, I’m gonna do it right.” 

“If you say so. Have fun, man.” To Tyson, loading his suitcase into Nate’s rental, Kerfy yells, “Tys, you ride with Gabe, I want to talk to Nate about—the next retreat or whatever.”

Tyson’s immediate response is, “Hell _no_ , there’s not going to be any more retreats!” but Nate makes the decision for him and shoves him towards Gabe, pulling Kerfy in excitedly. Kerfy shoots a look back at Gabe that tells him how much he owes him for this, and also how ridiculous he is, and Gabe shoots him a quick nod in agreement. He knows.

The various rentals start pulling out and Gabe watches them go. He’s not sure any of them would say they feel closer as teammates after this; they were pretty close to begin with, he thinks, or none of them would’ve survived this. He knows they have a good room, strong enough to deal with teammates like Nate who just wants what’s best for them. 

And strong enough, Gabe knows, to deal with _this_ : Tyson and Gabe standing outside their rental car, their stuff loaded in, and Gabe trying not to chicken out. “Hey,” Gabe says as Tyson goes to get into the car. “Wait a sec, I wanted to ask you something.”

“What’s up?” Tyson asks, turning to face him.

Gabe looks over his shoulder at Josty and JT in the car, nodding at them. He gets two enthusiastic thumbs up in return, and then Josty leans forward to mess with the aux cord.

And then ABBA is blasting through the quiet, cold mountain air, the opening lyrics of Take A Chance On Me blaring through. Tyson jumps and starts laughing a little, turning to yell back at the guys, “Hey, come on, you are not touching that thing again if you’re going to play this stuff,” but he turns to face Gabe again when he says, “Tyson, hey.”

“Hey,” Tyson says, rolling his eyes. 

“I asked them to put it on,” Gabe says, swallowing hard. “I have a plan.”

“What?”

“I just wanted to—it seemed romantic.” He feels way too self-conscious all of a sudden, even though he has all faith in ABBA. It’s not the song, he thinks. It’s finding the right words, really. 

Tyson blinks at him. “Romantic? Like…” He breaks off, brow furrowed. Gabe takes a deep breath. 

“Right, romantic. So I could—I wanted to ask you out.” Tyson stares at him, so Gabe clarifies, “On a date.”

“On a date,” Tyson repeats dumbly. Then he starts laughing again, which would be horrifying if Gabe didn’t already know Tyson pretty well. Hope soars through his chest. “Oh my god. Did you steal this from The Office?”

“What? No! I loved this song first!” Gabe’s trying not to get too distracted by how insulted he is by that accusation; he’s Swedish!

“You totally ripped off The Office to ask me out, holy shit. That’s incredible.”

“I did _not_ , this was completely my idea!” 

“Sure, sure—what, could you not get anyone to do it acapella with you?” He turns around to face the car again, where Josty and JT are ducked in the backseat. “You guys won’t sing with your captain?”

“I will totally sing,” Josty says, head popping up from the backseat before JT tugs him down again. 

Tyson loses it laughing and Gabe huffs angrily. “I could sing! Do you want me to sing?”

“Nobody has to sing, I’m just messing with you,” Tyson says. He’s grinning really big even as the laughter dies down, and he’s suddenly standing very close to Gabe, moving so fast that Gabe briefly wonders if someone told him Gabe had some kind of booze hidden on him. 

“So are you gonna keep messing with me, or are you gonna go out with me?” Gabe asks, challenge in his voice, covering up the slight quiver of doubt. He _thinks_ Tyson’s in, he’s pretty sure the plan worked and of course it did, it was a good fucking plan, but he really wants to hear Tyson say it. 

“Isn’t that the same thing?” Tyson asks, and when Gabe opens his mouth to complain, Tyson just swoops in and kisses him hard, arms wrapping around his waist. 

“So, yes?” Gabe asks when they break the kiss, to be a jerk. Tyson grins and rolls his eyes.

“ _Yes_. Dumbass.”

Behind them, Josty and JT are honking the horn of the rental car and flashing the lights as the voices of ABBA fade out, and Gabe kisses Tyson again and thinks he’d probably do another bye week like this, as long as it ended up exactly like this.


End file.
